


Shelter from the Rain

by TurnipTitaness



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Angsty Crowley (Good Omens), Anxious Aziraphale (Good Omens), Asexual Aziraphale (Good Omens), Asexual Character, Asexual Crowley (Good Omens), Asexual Relationship, Asexuality Spectrum, Eventual Fluff, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Light Angst, M/M, Post-Almost Apocalypse (Good Omens), Scene: Garden of Eden (Good Omens), Worried Aziraphale (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2021-01-29 03:53:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21403750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TurnipTitaness/pseuds/TurnipTitaness
Summary: It begins, as it will end, with rain.Listen, this first chapter will (if I can write at all) break your heart. I'M SORRY IN ADVANCE! But it gets better, I promise.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 37





	1. Rain like Tears

There was a bright flash in the sky, followed almost immediately by a low, menacing rumble. The angel standing on the wall beside him flinched, and Crawly glanced sideways at him. 

“Thunder,” he remarked, although a moment ago he hadn’t known what it was. Much as he hated Hell’s habit of simply pouring information into him, Crawly had to admit it was convenient at times. Particularly when one happened to be in the middle of a conversation with a rather charming angel and one was running out of things to say. 

“Yes.” The angel shivered, fluffing out his feathers slightly. “And there will be rain too, I’m afraid. Any second now.”

Crawly frowned. “What’s rain?”

As soon as he had spoken, something struck him on the top of the head with a soft “plop,” and trickled wetly down the back of his neck.

“Water from the sky,” the angel answered him.

Crawly looked up, squinting. As if on cue, the heavens opened up and water began falling everywhere, splashing into Crawly’s hair and against the stones at his feet. Instinctively, he sidled closer to the angel, who unfurled one wing and spread it over the demon, protecting him from the uncomfortable new weather. 

Crawly looked over at him in surprise, his golden eyes wide. But the angel seemed entirely unaware of what he’d done as he stared out over the barren landscape. The demon’s heart did a strange little flip-flop inside his chest as he studied the being beside him, with his wide, guileless eyes and bright fluff of hair that was being slowly subdued and plastered down to his head by the rain. 

What was this creature, who would gladly give away his celestial weapon to those pitiful humans and shield a demon without a second thought? He certainly wasn’t in the average run of angels, Crawly thought. Not in his experience, at least.

The angel sighed and wrung his hands. “Oh, I do hope they’ll be all right.”

Crawly blinked, trying to think of something comforting to say as they watched Adam and Eve disappear behind a sand dune. “Oh, I expect so,” he said finally. “They’ve got your sword, haven’t they? And they’ll find shelter soon enough. Anyway, this water from the sky probably feels quite nice on the feet after all that hot sand.”

“Yes, I suppose it must.” The angel’s expression brightened considerably, and Crawly had to work hard to keep the grin that tugged at his lips down to a reasonable size. 

“Rain has a good many practical benefits, you know,” the angel continued. “We had a meeting about it a few days ago. To strategize how it ought to be introduced. Personally, I favored a gradual increase in the amount of morning dew, to sort of ease everyone into the idea.”

Crawly nodded, trying to concentrate on what the angel was saying, but distracted by the sudden onslaught of happiness that was flooding through him. He couldn’t quite believe how well this was going. When he’d spotted the angel on the wall and slithered up to meet him, he’d expected nothing but anger and disgust; possibly even an attempt to destroy him for what he’d done. Yet for some reason he’d been unable to stop himself. And now here he was, huddled under the angel’s soft wing, having a conversation about sky-water.

He swayed slightly from side to side, enjoying the heavy sensation of having wings attached to his back again; enjoying the feeling of having a friend. However, as the angel’s face crumpled into worry again, he became still, dismay seeping in and dissipating all his happiness. 

“Still,” the angel said, “it must be upsetting for them, poor things. All these changes so soon after losing their home.”

A stab of guilt flashed through Crawly. 

Oh.

Oh.

Losing their home. Of course. That’s what he’d done for them. He’d lost them their home. Their paradise.

The pain calcified into anger, and he glowered out into the desert, his eyes settling on the lion’s corpse. He hadn’t meant to, after all. How was he to know God would be so upset over a little thing like an apple? He moved abruptly away from the angel, and the rain spattered down on him again. 

Crawly shook the water off his wings in irritation. “Ngh,” he said, his voice suddenly harsh. “Not much fun, losing your home. Still, that’s the way life goes, I suppose.”

The angel looked over at him, his wing still outstretched foolishly and his blue eyes full of confusion and hurt. He opened his mouth to speak, but all of a sudden, urgent, insistent trumpets blared out above them. The angel started and looked up at the sky, then back at the demon, folding his wing behind him with self-conscious primness. 

“That will be Gabriel,” he said with an apologetic half-smile. “Probably calling another emergency meeting. Right, well… best be getting along then.”

“Right.” Crawly tried desperately to gather his wits about him, to somehow salvage the mess he’d made. “Well, it’s been nice…”

But the angel was already gone.

“…chatting with you,” Crawly finished lamely, feeling suddenly bereft. He realized miserably that he had never asked the angel’s name, and somehow that made him lonelier than he had been since the fall. He stood on the wall by himself a while longer, looking up at the sky. The rain streamed down his face like tears.


	2. Rain like Blessings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I promised you I would make it better, and I will.   
This is Post-Nopeageddon.

Aziraphale watched as the bus lumbered slowly down the narrow village street. “I suppose I should get him to drop me off at the bookshop,” he remarked, feeling suddenly exhausted by all the events of the day.

Crowley shifted carefully around to face him. “It burned down,” he said softly, his forehead creasing with concern. “Remember?”

Aziraphale looked away from him, his chest constricting painfully as his mind processed the words. Burned down. Of course. Crowley had told him earlier, hadn’t he? With all the chaos that had to be averted, it had gone right out of his head.

Although he knew the bench beneath him was just as solid as ever, Aziraphale felt adrift, as if he were floating, or… falling. Was this how it felt, to lose a home? What would he do now, without his shop? Where would he go?

The demon fidgeted beside him, looking suddenly nervous. “You can stay at my place,” he offered, his voice small and hesitant. “If you like.”

Aziraphale stared at his friend, trying to be sensible, trying to wrestle his heart back to a more natural rhythm. “I… I don’t think my side would like that,” he said finally. 

“You don’t have a side anymore,” Crowley said simply. “Neither of us do. We’re on our own side.” He took a deep breath. “Like Agnes said, we’re going to have to choose our faces wisely.”

Before the angel could respond, Crowley hailed the bus and got on, leaving Aziraphale sitting on the bench, his mind racing. Their own side. Was that what Agnes had meant? That he would have to choose between Heaven and his friend?

The bus doors began to shut and Aziraphale stood up quickly, a new feeling bubbling up inside him, making him feel as light as one of the feathers in his wings. Choose? Why, there was no choice at all. It was Crowley. It had always been Crowley, right from the beginning. He hurried up the steps and down the aisle, that strange new feeling making him bold and reckless. As the two of them slid into a seat together, Aziraphale grabbed his friend’s hand and squeezed it, not letting go even as the bus pulled away. Crowley didn’t look over at him, but out of the corner of his eye, Aziraphale could see a tiny smile quivering at the edges of his mouth.

By the time they arrived in London, it had started to rain. Big, fat drops thudded against the roof of the bus, and Aziraphale wrinkled his nose in disgust as he looked out through the flowing windows to the soaked pavement. It would take ages for his coat to dry after walking through that.

The bus came to a stop outside a tall building. “Right, this is me,” Crowley said, dropping Aziraphale’s hand and edging past him. He sped toward the exit without a backward glance, and Aziraphale’s heart sank, the new feeling that had stayed with him all the way from Tadfield subsiding at last. Did Crowley regret asking him to stay, Aziraphale wondered as he followed his friend? 

But as he paused at the top of the steps, Crowley turned around, a huge grin on his face. With a quick, upward snap of his fingers, he miracled a big black umbrella into existence and held it out, ready for Aziraphale to descend. 

“Oh!” Aziraphale felt his cheeks turn pink at Crowley’s thoughtfulness. The new feeling was back in full force, and this time, Aziraphale knew its name. It was freedom. 

Aziraphale came down the steps and reached for the umbrella’s handle, his hand settling comfortably on top of Crowley’s. “Thank you,” he said. “Thank you, my dear, dear friend.”

Together, they hurried across the pavement to Crowley’s door. The rain streamed down like a blessing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There, see? I told you it would get fluffy.  
As always, I adore comments. The good, the bad, the weird. Bring 'em on.

**Author's Note:**

> I'M SORRY, OKAY??? But I promise, I promise, Chapter 2 will make it all better again.  
As always, I really, really love comments. So, I mean... comment, please? Anything at all; stuff you liked, stuff that was weird... Anything.


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